Thursday, April 30, 2009

Erotic Cycles

Betty knows just how much Bimbo is turned on by cycles.This is what I would consider not conservative animation. Grim isn't holding anything back. He's just doing what he thinks is naturally funny. He's not checking his rule book first.You'd have a million people saying no to this kind of thing today - or even in the 50s.Not just because it's dirty - but because it's too cartoony. It "doesn't make sense".This arm wave is funny as hell, you better say no to it, quick!And of course the rubber butt slap is the topper of it all.The Fleischers had their own sort of "limited animation " techniques. They would animate a lot of cycles or bits of animation and repeat them a couple times. This could essentially cut their budgets in half. This is different than say, HB's limited animation of the late 50s - where they were trying to hide the animation. The Fleischers made the cycles themselves funny and worth looking at more than once.''

By the 50s animation was still professional, but outside of some commercials, was pretty conservative. "We don't do that sort of thing anymore".I love this early purity.To me, this is the essential part of animation- moving things funny.Now you have to fight like Hell to get anyone to allow you to do what simply comes naturally to the medium.Look what this is doing for Bimbo!Don't you wish your gal/dog? would do some erotic cycles for you?http://www.cartoonthrills.org/blog/BettyBoop/mysteriousmose/bettydance1slapbuttsml.mov

What gets me most about this clip is the slapping sound you hear twice toward the end of the slapping animation. It's rough and startlingly convincing, although I'm still not entirely convinced it isn't just pops in the old audio track.

You could get away with this now but...it would have to have a rating. Some way for the studio to say that kids weren't meant to see it so they could avoid potential litigation. Hollywood is run by lawyers. People still tend to think of cartoons as kids stuff though even after decades of Simpsons and Family Guy. I think it is slowly changing though. One must be vigilant and persistent.